bbc.co.uk is failing in its role as a "trusted guide" to the internet, funneling users to commercial websites, with click-through rates declining despite a boom in traffic to the corporation's website, according to the BBC Trust.
The trust's review of bbc.co.uk's service licence and remit, published today, has also called for a review of the corporation's external internet search function, questioning its validity in the face of competition from commercial rivals such as Google.
bbc.co.uk's service licence states that it should act as a "trusted guide" to the internet, "guiding users to the wider web and linking to external websites with high public value".
However, the BBC Trust said it was "disappointed" to see findings that showed that in July 2007 there were just 4.6m click-throughs by UK users from bbc.co.uk to external websites, with an overall pattern "trending downwards".
The volume of click-throughs from some of the most visited parts of the bbc.co.uk - news and sport - declined in 2007 compared to the previous year.
BBC management argued that the pattern could be explained because bbc.co.uk is now used as more of a "destination" than "as a means of navigating the web" by users.
However, the BBC Trust said that comments from the public consultation and research "suggest that the ineffectiveness and inaccessibility of the links is the main factor preventing greater usage".
"We believe that effective external linking is a key way in which the BBC can manage the risk of becoming a 'dominant gateway service' identified in the [Philip] Graf review [of bbc.co.uk in 2004]," the trust said.
"We believe this risk is still very much alive... We also believe that the BBC has a role in linking users of bbc.co.uk to external sites which provide content and services which contribute to the BBC's public purposes."
The trust said it now expects click-through measurement to be part of bbc.co.uk's regular performance reporting.
"We are [also] not convinced that BBC management's ambition to be 'part of' the web rather than 'on it' by embedding BBC content on other sites, such as YouTube, plays any role in acting as a 'trusted guide' to the wider web," the BBC Trust added.
"Rather, this is mainly a way of marketing BBC content to those who might not otherwise access it."
The BBC Trust also found that bbc.co.uk's internal search engine "is not effective and its usage is declining".
Referrals from the internal search engine declined from 24% of total bbc.co.uk traffic to 19% between the last quarter of 2006 and the same period last year, the trust noted.
"We support an improvement to this offering, which does not appear to meet user expectations at present," it said.
The BBC Trust also called for a review of the need to provide an external internet search capability.
It questioned "whether the BBC should have a role in providing mainstream web search" and said it was "asking management to take a decision on the future of this function following this review".
"We are not convinced that this is a role the BBC can or should play, except for possibly in limited and well-defined areas such as children's."
The trust cited figures of low levels of usage for the BBC's web search service - about 3 million monthly users, compared with 28 million for Google and 6 million each for Yahoo, MSN and Ask.
"In the context of a web search market which has become increasingly commercially attractive, we have considered whether there is a role for a public service engine," said the BBC Trust.
"We asked for additional information on the BBC's intended role in web search from BBC management and understand that its future is being debated and that there are currently no plans to develop it."
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